The Weaning Battle Continues (during hail storm)

Let's get this, uh, barn swallow out of here. Doesn't take them long to get in here, does it? Where'd they go? They're going there. There they go. Oh, that one's almost so close. Why is it not getting out? Oh, watch this. Turn the light off. They follow the light. Oh, there you go. Good idea. Where they at? Fly. I have no idea. There you go. See, look left. Do not keep these shut at all times. We should keep the lights on too, huh? Ready to put the chickens back up in here? Do I want to put the chickens back up in here? Got to turn it with the machine every other day. I don't think you're gonna have place for the chickens in here. Massive compost pile from our deep bedding. Um, I like to put chickens on it, but one of the problems with chickens on it is they get their feet dirty and then the eggs get dirty. You put them back here? What? Yeah. And then how are you gonna turn this? You're gonna have to turn it tomorrow. You take one, one pile from here and put it over there. It's steaming. That's a good sign. The cows and the sheep are out, so I'm torn. Do we put the chickens back over here? We only have— take the time to do it, then go do the— go sort the cows. You don't think they left, do you? Just move the chickens. You can move them tomorrow afternoon. Yeah, see, tomorrow we're going riding, so I don't want to do any extra chores in the morning. We really need to just go get the cows. Plus, we've got to get our finished compost out of here. So then we can put the fence back for the chickens. Get the net secured while I go find the cows. Okay, okay. Well, I had good intentions cooping them up, hoping to move them this morning. I'm liking this pasture setup too. I may take the biggest ones like them two and try to run them behind the animals, but we're gonna need some more time. Right now we're trying to deal with drying off a calf and weaning little sheep, and it's been quite the challenge this year. Somehow the horse made its way over here. Right here I hear cows. Funny thing is, the animals were over there and somehow they put themselves in today's paddock. All but the, the cows. Sheep made their way over here. The horse— this is telling me that old Blaze hasn't really bonded with the cows. I do not give up easy. Today we're going to continue putting in changes so that this will work and we can keep those little— you separated and the little calf. Everybody's confined now. Nobody's roaming the farm. Let's get honey. Out of the fence and milk her. There she sees it. There she sees it. She just passed up alfalfa, did a lap around the fence, accidentally inadvertently got the sheep's attention. Stop clinging on that. Oh my gosh, everything's thrown off. She's been eating on whatever she wants all night long. So you don't even want the alfalfa? Cows are creatures of habit, and so she's normally used to, okay, uh, everybody moves over, I stay put, they milk me. Now it's like, oh, all night long we're freestyle, and then they moving me out. Fell backwards and different. Put them back in. Get the calf. We have to get the calf in there first. Okay, because the mama will just fly away. Okay, you can't cut everybody else but the moms and, and get them over here. We have to, we have to herd everybody out because the moms will leave the babies. Shall we test the milk and see how yellow? Because of how white this tongue is, because the calf isn't drinking it. I don't know if we should either. That should dissolve pretty quickly. Okay, it's too jelly. Yeah, it's too thick. Well, aren't you drinking it? If it's got mastitis, it could be what that barnyard flavor is, so it's not very appetizing. I think you'll love it. I'm just gonna put that milk in there. I need to hustle so I can move those sheep back with the boys. They're putting up the nets. The pig is not eating, they're sick, and that's what we have. Yesterday anyway, I did see her drinking. Look who jumped up first thing. He did it back. No, this is Pound Cake who jumped up. She's better. I think she's better. She's back. You're back. You just had a bad day. It's okay. Yes! I can barely get the feed in. First thing we need to do is get all the sheep back over to yesterday's paddock, and then we'll bring the mamas back. One thing that we have going for us today is the mama sheep will be over here and the little baby sheep will be way over there. But I have an idea for the night. It's gonna be foolproof. Help that cow! Help that cow! Harriet! Harriet! Harriet! Harriet! Harriet! Harriet! Harriet! Now we have to get the mamas out. Hold on. I don't really care where they go right now, so long as we get them out. One of the little ones got past us. Uh, you can't cut one out and herd it anywhere, so we might have to get everybody back in there. That was lucky. We got the little one and only one adult in. All right, now we can get all the adults over. Hopefully they'll stay. That's one thing we're going to be able to do. Actually, I'll make that net smaller. It'll hit harder. That'll be one thing that we'll do. Whoa, you're good! You're good, dude. Good job. Just maybe we're gonna nail it today. There's overlap fence here. Then the board, the bow. Let's get this overlap. I'm going to try to go across right here, but I have to pick up this net first. Got them down to just one net, so it should hit really hard. Okay, that is sitting so incredibly hard. That is 7.8. It's been hitting at 2. They don't need much of a paddock. Because they're not eating much. Josiah just had a good idea. Maybe put the sheep in the ram pen. There's a 16-foot— a 16-foot metal— it's up there, but it won't go over this crazy wild terrain. They're gonna stay in it. Here's our deal, we gotta dry those moms off. Milk dries up significantly 3-4 days, but it can take up to 4, 6 weeks. And I guess if they got back with them, it's going to get it stimulated again. So it's gonna— it's gonna be a crazy— I don't know, my experience, if I can remember right, how long are they crazy like this? A week. Another idea is to put them in the ram pen and just move them around on down here. That's what we'll do. We'll make sure our fence is hot, and then the night we'll have a little fence like this for the calf. And the sheep right behind the cows. We can get that really hot. Hopefully we have enough Energizer. Hitting so hot, that's at like 7 point something. We're not really advancing, like no new projects, although we might put a lid on this. We're doing really good. We're gonna put a lid on this, otherwise we're really just going to maintain and correct and nail down the current systems we have. There's a lot to do and to set up and ensure this success today. Of course, we need to follow this throughout the day to see if they stay put. They don't even care about eating day one. Project number 2: the heifers got out. Why do you think the heifers got out? Probably out of food. Heifers probably got out because they were out of food, huh? Oh, the other cows came over here and busted them out, huh? Let's see if this is working. Blinking red, red. That's means it's weak. Go see if we can switch out the batteries for some fresh ones just to be safe, and get some electrical tape to mend the cords. Cows didn't eat this multiflora rose, but the sheep sure would have. If we have to, we'll put the little baby lambs over here. You got 5 posts? Okay, go get them to Josiah. Now we're gonna move the heifers over. This is the trick. You need help in there? You want me to spot the gate? They says okay. All right, freedom! It's hard to get them away from the herd. Okay, good, nobody saw that. We'll do it. We'll go that way. So as long as we don't get on the garden. No. Hey, hey, dang it! Get in! You go around and stop them from going up. We're not gonna chance the garden. We're gonna herd them this way and then around the garden. There's a fence. You're gonna help with that? Get them, cowboy! We're gonna herd them behind the house. We can get them out of sight of these guys. We're doing good. We're gonna go this way. Come on. No, no. Good job, Henry. Heard everybody over. All right, let's herd everybody. That could get crazy because then everybody's out and going towards the fence. But if we herd everybody out, they could have a spry moment and really tear stuff up. That's good. Get in, get in. You stay on the road, you keep them coming this way. Good job. We're gonna try alfalfa. I don't know if Still, that'll lure them away. Let them both get a taste, Annie. Even food lure is not stronger than companionship. Minty's following it. Hey, they're being lured away. Really cutting them off. Side. Lily, back up! I know the alfalfa's right there. She's over here near the garden, thankfully not in it. Okay, I wonder when they're gonna let me just herd everybody downstream. Come on, hurry! Here he comes. Come on. There we go. Hey, we got him across! Two across. Now we're doing good. See, they're going a lot easier now that we're across the creek and away. She's on you now. We're far enough away from the herd. Is this the way to go get it, Josiah? Is it open? Nancy, you're gonna get that when you get there, honey. The reward! Good job, team. Let's not let that happen again. That was a pain. Josie, you want to show me your fort? What y'all can do with a Mini-X. Every boy's dream. What'd you build? Bunker. Does it work? It works okay. Did you shoot out of it? Yeah. Did you get shot in it? No. Did you shoot anybody from it? Yeah. Yeah. What do we have by panels? We have one cattle panel. There's one outside I noticed. So do you think we need that, or do you think we can do these nets on individual energizers? Why the nets? We're back up at the cows. Their fence is not yet on. We're gonna see if we can't hook it up to the grid. We have the opportunity to go to the grid here. It's a 30— that has to be plugged into a 240. That's a 63. Joules. Uh, I think those little, uh, Energizers we're using are like maybe 1.5, maybe. It's coming under the ground into this. We can't just hang this up there because then it, it's hitting the metal. Wrap it around real good. Let's not, let's not play any games. Tomorrow's our outdoor adventure day, mountain biking, so we, we can't be having anything go wrong while I'm gone and into the woods. Oh my gosh, 7! 7! There's so many nets. That's why I love the grid. I think that solar energizer was getting it to maybe 1 or 2. Walking up through here to set up the next net, and look, where is this mud coming from? Maybe the little silt pond is overflowing. If you know. Looks like we have a little spring right here. Comes down and then goes over this hump. Doesn't seem like much, but we got a little ditch going. We kept it from going down our road, and as we have rain events, perhaps this this will— now it has a footing, maybe it'll dig it out a little bit more. Fruit tree's coming in amazingly. It feels really good to have done that. I needed to give myself permission to just do chores, even if it takes till 11:40, and get things set up right, be prepared for tomorrow. And it's okay if I don't have this big exciting project because that's homesteading. You don't always have that. I mean, that's what I want, that's what I love to go for, that's the heart, right? But oftentimes you just have to maintain and be okay with it, and there was peace in that today. So thank you for going along with me on that. An Abundance Plus member texted or DM'd me and they said, what water nipples or cups do you use? Talking about our chicken water. We have geese too and wondering if they can drink from it as well. Yes, geese can drink from it. That's from Jill. Oh good, that's our— oh heck yes. Uh, and I, I just linked— I don't know if you can see that, but I just linked that to her. That's a Premier One poultry nipple waterers. Uh, you guys want to look that up. But the point of this is Jill was able to DM me. She's a premium member at Abundance Plus. We don't have to do text anymore. You can DM from the app. So if you're a premium member, hit me up. You might even start doing a question of the day type of thing and answer it on the vlog or make a special video for it that would end up on social media. So that could be a lot of fun. So DM me, take advantage of that. You're not bothering me. Get the Abundance Plus app if you're a member, of course. Duh, right? Make sure it's updated. Go to the App Store And if you look up Abundance Plus, and if the button says update, you need to hit update and get it updated, and then you can DM. Got a series of little jumps down through here. I just love it that they're utilizing our entire property, this neat little spot here in the woods. Hey, you jumped a little bit! You jumped that nice! You'll be biking with us in no time, bro. The lambs are still in, so I think what's going to be the kicker today is the fence is almost, if not 3 times as powerful. Okay, we'll see if that holds those lambs out. Look, the moms are hopefully pregnant. They need to be putting their energy towards new babies so that we can continue. I had this lamb this afternoon. We have our results. A2A2 is, is Minty. That little calf heifer, we heard it over this morning, has a perfect condition in my mind. Perfect. Is she, is she stud muffins too? Yeah. And who's the mom? She's stud muffins. Okay. So she'll make a really good milk cow. Whoever Harriet's mom is, a good build. Harriet's okay, but she has— she's not quite the build. All right, I'm gonna click it. So if she's A2, A2, it's easier to digest the milk. Okay, go ahead. So you can find that. How is this happening? So good. Stud Muffin lives on strong. He does. We'll have 4 cows. That's so— we'll have 4 milk cows. Stud muffin will live on in 2 of our cows. She's A2, A2. All right. All these years we didn't get not one heifer from them. They've always been A1. She was the tamest of them this morning, just Annie herding her over with alfalfa. Good work, my man. You did it, you did it, old stud. Had a hailstorm this afternoon. Everybody's seeking shelter under the oak tree. It doesn't hurt at all. They break upon impact. Whoa, the yard is filling up. Bright sky, so it can't last long. Just over here checking out the cabin, and then this. It can't last too long. It is what it is, right? Yeah, and there's nothing we can do about it. For the cabin. We have a window in right there now. There was no window there. There was no window there. There was no windows there. There were no windows there or there. There's one going in up over there. Oh, Jonah brought home the goods! 15 more. Does that make 50? We're gonna have 50 gallons of strawberries. But if you think about it, That's only 1 gallon of strawberries a week. Between jelly and, um, or jam and strawberries in our yogurt and dried strawberries, we're just gonna have to make it work. But for this family, I think we can do it. 1 gallon of strawberries a week for a year, that's pretty cool. This is so much of our fruit source that we don't need that. We don't need 1 gallon a week because we're We're gonna have blueberries and raspberries. I know, and this needs to be our fruit choice. We don't need to be buying fruit at the grocery store this evening. Crazy rain, and it's supposed to rain throughout the night, even some hailstorm. I don't know if those little sheep will use it because they're just pressed against the fence wanting mom. I'm gonna get them the sheep shawl so if they want it, they can take cover. Okay, we were gonna calf separate, but let's not. Let's not. Thunder and lightning. Let's just let the calf have the milk and the mom. They can be under that oak tree together tonight. And you saw the trouble it is. We gave them mom to get them back separated. All right, let's go. Helping me. Oh my gosh, not the time to get tangled up. Out! Oh good, they're using it. They're smart enough. I was afraid they wouldn't use it. They're using it. You guys are great. Rams can be dumb sometimes, like turkeys. Look what We should get out of here in case it gets bigger. The big cows have— they have the tree, they're safe. I get done and it chills out. Couldn't be more thrilled those sheep are getting under that. I didn't think they would. Without the storm, I would have given this a 95% plus chance they're going to stay away from each other, given as hot as each of those fences are and as far away they are from each other. With this storm, I give it an 85% chance. We won't know till tomorrow. Time will tell. Happy day. See you then.